Eli Lilly has announced that it will invest more than $1.2 billion to expand and update its manufacturing plant, Lilly del Caribe, in Carolina.
The facility will produce orforglipron, a new oral medication that the company expects to submit to global regulatory agencies for obesity by the end of this year. The weight loss drug will also seek approval for Type 2 diabetes.
The investment is expected to create 1,000 construction jobs and 100 high-tech manufacturing positions in Puerto Rico.
Orforglipron
The new drug, orforglipron, is an oral alternative to injectable weight loss medications like Ozempic and Lilly’s own Mounjaro.
These medications are GLP-1 inhibitors. They tend to suppress appetite and make it easier for users to lose weight.
Roughly 12% of adults in the U.S. have tried these drugs, and the market is currently in the billions per year. Fierce Pharma expects these drugs, the use of which has skyrocketed in recent years, to become the most-prescribed medications in the United States by the end of the decade.
However, most users of the drugs do not continue using them over the long term, with as many as 75% of users giving up before the one year mark. The side effects of these drugs are unpleasant: diarrhea, nausea, vomiting, and abdominal pain in more than 82% of patients.
People who soldier on in spite of the side effects have shown weight loss up to 22% of their original body weight. Those who stop taking the drug generally gain back the weight they lost. Only 14% of users continue for three years, and people who try the drug but don’t persist are likely to see negative results from the weight gain, since they often lost muscle but regained mostly fat.
Another factor in the lack of persistence with these drugs is the need for weekly injections. One study found that 40% of those who discontinued taking the drug objected to the shots. Many people are afraid of needles, and may not even try the drug or may discontinue use soon after beginning.
Orforglipron is a daily pill. Lilly — along with millions of doctors and patients — is hoping that the oral medication will be easier for people to stick with.
Orforglipron has led to an average 12.4% weight loss over a period of 72 weeks (about a year and a half) in clinical trials. It has similar side effects to current GLP-1 inhibitors, but does not require the use of a needle.
Made in Puerto Rico
Manufacturing is on the rise in Puerto Rico, reaching 44.21% of the economy in 2024 compared with 42.21% under Section 936, an expired provision of U.S. federal tax that Congress ended when congressional watchdogs concluded that corporations were using the section of the tax code to shelter income with relatively minimal benefit to Puerto Rico. Pharmaceuticals still make up the largest manufacturing sector in Puerto Rico, and the Island exports more medications than any state.
One of the factors that initially reduced pharmaceutical manufacturing following the end of Section 936 was not the law’s repeal but the expiration of numerous drug patents. U.S. manufacturers have generally not been able to produce generic or biosimilar drugs profitably in the United States, so they tend to rely on those drugs that are still protected by patents. Lilly’s new form of a highly popular category of drugs could be a blockbuster drug, well worth producing in America.
Where much of the pharmaceutical sector’s impact on the GDP under Section 936 was illusory, relying as it did on transfer payments, the new build at Lilly del Caribe is expected to create local jobs. The new drug, orforglipron, will actually be made in Puerto Rico. The company is receiving tariff exemptions in return for producing the medication in the United States.
Construction on the expanded oral solid medicine product manufacturing facility is estimated to begin in 2026, with plans to start producing medicine by the end of 2028.
